Sorry I should've realized you think the unions are biased. How about other community orhs we've worked with? I suppose they're all biased too? Oh and do tell me more about edtablishment politicians. It's not like we have them...everywhere. Again the point is building from below, forcimg the politicians to back. We've done that without seats but we believe they should be challenged electorally as well.

Ozleft:
An independent forum of strategy, tactics and history in the Australian left, green and labour movements.

Erm... I'm going to go ahead and say the site is biased when it's name is "OzLeft" and it's byline is "And independent forum of strategy, tactics and history in the Australian left, green and labour movements". Is it really that hard to find a newspaper article on this community involvement that isn't on a socialist/leftist/marxist site?

You would have a point if the actual article was produced by the website and not lifted from the unions paper._________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Sorry I should've realized you think the unions are biased. How about other community orhs we've worked with? I suppose they're all biased too? Oh and do tell me more about edtablishment politicians. It's not like we have them...everywhere. Again the point is building from below, forcimg the politicians to back. We've done that without seats but we believe they should be challenged electorally as well.

Feel free to cheer and rally your cause once you can actually successfully challenge electorally in the U.S.

indeed I am. Looking forward to the next years local elections._________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

so i'm sure you would believe it if i said that guns in schools make people safer and, when asked for evidence, i link you to the NRA?

I could link you to The Stranger, Huffingtonpost or Seattle Times, if you prefer. But I'm pretty sure I've already put up those links.
Latest numbers are 20,313 and 29.36%. Not too bad for a first run against an 18 year incumbent, indeed while having a budget of $18,455 versus Chopp's $154,955 and running openly as a socialist. And having had to fight a court battle to win that right._________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

then we're back to the delusion that Sawant's 29% in one of the most liberal districts in the country--meaning in one of the most hardcore left constituencies, she could only win 29% of the vote--is some kind of victory for socialists.

seriously, if socialists can only get less than a third of the most left-leaning voters in the country to vote for them, you've got a problem, not a victory. it shows that not even the left trusts you.

then we're back to the delusion that Sawant's 29% in one of the most liberal districts in the country--meaning in one of the most hardcore left constituencies, she could only win 29% of the vote--is some kind of victory for socialists.

seriously, if socialists can only get less than a third of the most left-leaning voters in the country to vote for them, you've got a problem, not a victory. it shows that not even the left trusts you.

it's like you're not even hearing what I'm saying, man. Have you ever been involved in an election? I have. It's quite a bit more difficult than just having good ideas and if people know about them and agree with them they'll vote for you. No, man, to get any votes at all you need campaign for them, especially if you come from the underdog position of being relatively unknown and have a shoe-string campaign running against people that have neither of those problems. So again, I have taken part in campaigns like that, I think I have a fair idea what I'm talking about and, as others have alluded to, I suspect it's even more hard work in the U.S. So it's not just that I and Sawant are in the same org that I find the campaigns results respectable but because I've been through stuff like that._________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

ITT
Him continues to insist he knows more about how politics and the electorate work in the U.S. than residents do.

Your point is invalid. Read what I said again. That is if the point you were trying to make was:

Quote:

if you can only get 28% of the vote in one of the most liberal areas of the country, there is no historic mandate to accomplish anything at all.

or a variant there of.
Or to make it even more clear what I mean:

Him wrote:

So again, I have taken part in campaigns like that, I think I have a fair idea what I'm talking about and, as others have alluded to,I suspect it's even more hard work in the U.S. So it's not just that I and Sawant are in the same org that I find the campaigns results respectable but because I've been through stuff like that.

_________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

There needs to be a fundamental shift in U.S. citizen perspective before socialist politicians stand a snowballs chance in hell of accomplishing anything except on the very smallest and most local of levels.

Youessians need to know some more severe suffering underneath the republicans and democrats first because you have to have a shock big enough to change or open the minds of those who immediately close off at the mention of the word socialism. Remember that the disconnect has gotten so bad that people here will literally bitch about socialism while taking their unemployment checks and farm subsidies and complain about the costs of school lunch going up._________________

There needs to be a fundamental shift in U.S. citizen perspective before socialist politicians stand a snowballs chance in hell of accomplishing anything except on the very smallest and most local of levels.

Youessians need to know some more severe suffering underneath the republicans and democrats first because you have to have a shock big enough to change or open the minds of those who immediately close off at the mention of the word socialism. Remember that the disconnect has gotten so bad that people here will literally bitch about socialism while taking their unemployment checks and farm subsidies and complain about the costs of school lunch going up.

Yeah, I know. But it's not like you can just sit back and wait for it to happen. Which brings me back to: Latest numbers are 20,313 and 29.36%. Not too bad for a first run against an 18 year incumbent, indeed while having a budget of $18,455 versus Chopp's $154,955 and running openly as a socialist. And having had to fight a court battle to win that right.

Interestingly rasmussen polls tend to show a similar 30%-ish support for socialism in the U.S, of course significantly higher among people below 30 and african-americans._________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Latest numbers are 20,313 and 29.36%. Not too bad for a first run against an 18 year incumbent, indeed while having a budget of $18,455 versus Chopp's $154,955 and running openly as a socialist.

Past performance is not indicative of future results.

Just because he got 29.36% in his first run doesn't mean his second run will improve on that number._________________The Thirties dreamed white marble and slipstream chrome, immortal crystal and burnished bronze, but the rockets on the covers of the Gernsback pulps had fallen on London in the dead of night, screaming. - William Gibson, The Gernsback Continuum

Latest numbers are 20,313 and 29.36%. Not too bad for a first run against an 18 year incumbent, indeed while having a budget of $18,455 versus Chopp's $154,955 and running openly as a socialist.

Past performance is not indicative of future results.

Just because he got 29.36% in his first run doesn't mean his second run will improve on that number.

*she
And again it's more than double what the republican challenger got in either of the two latest elections. but yeah, increasing on that number will require work, but it has certainly raised her profile and the profile of Socialist Alternative more generally. So an excellent starting point for working on a united left list for the local and mayoral elections._________________A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want? ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

you keep ignoring the part where Sawant scored about a quarter of the vote on the friendliest possible turf in the country for a socialist. she went out and campaigned and knocked on doors and planted lawn signs and rallied and out of the hardcore leftists in Washington's 43rd district she could only get a quarter of them to vote for her. in a race with no conservative spoiler. in an election climate where we're all supposed to be sick of the Democrats and don't trust them anymore. in a political climate where we're all supposed to be so welcoming of third parties and unconventional candidates. in the wake of Occupy Wall Street. with all that going for her, why did she lose by such an embarrassingly massive margin?

that is not a sign of progress and victory. that is a sign that it's time to sit down and reevaluate the entire movement and the entire environment in which it operates, because if it can't win over more than 29% of the left, something is very wrong with it and it is going nowhere.

because--and i realize you struggle with this point--29% does not win you anything in the United States. you don't get 29% of the seats. you don't get attention. you don't get respect. call me when you can break into the forties, if not actually win an election.

that you call it a "united left list" is just further indication that you understand nothing about United States politics.